


Walking The Green Mile

by lisachan



Series: Leoverse [56]
Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-28 09:03:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13900740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lisachan/pseuds/lisachan
Summary: Leo hates to bring Cody to places like this one, but he can't stop doing it now.





	Walking The Green Mile

**Author's Note:**

> **WARNING:** This story is a **what if** from the original 'verse. In the canon course of events that followed the beginning of Broken Heart Syndrome, **this has never happened**.  
>  In this specific instance of the universe, Cody and Leo reconnected after years apart, and passion between them reignited and ended up exploding again. Later in this universe, Cody will end up leaving his current husband, Vince, to start a side relationship with Leo with Blaine's approval. This, though, happens way before that. While Blaine still didn't know what was happening between his husband and his ex boyfriend. Well, he's gonna find out now.  
> Written for this week's COW-T #8, Mission 5. Prompt was "regret".

This place is one of the worst Leo's ever seen – and he's been in a few dumps back in the day, when all he needed was a mattress to be fucked upon and whether there were sheets covering it instead of fleas was a detail of the smallest importance. Every time he walks past the door of the room he's, at this point, renting weekly (he never thought he would become one of those people – one of those people paying regularly for a place other than their own home to fuck with a person other than their own husband), he always thinks about Blaine and the hotel where he used to bring him when he was a kid. Man, that place was the shit. Spotless, classy, with discreet people who didn't look twice at them even though they could've been father and son.

This, instead, is the best he can do for Cody. A nauseating motel, dirty, wrecked, with damp patches covering the walls and with an old lady at the reception desk that keeps looking at them as if she couldn't decide if she should say a prayer for their depraved sinners souls or simply set fire to their bed.

He didn't _choose_ this place to begin with – he was just driving by it. He remembers that moment so well – even more how frustrated he was that afternoon. Blaine had been inside all day, he hadn't managed to find not even a second to be alone with Cody and he felt as though he was possessed by lustful demons. He kept seeing him sitting there in front of the window, drawing the landscape outside on his sketchbook, the curve of his neck so exposed, so inviting.

He had grabbed him by the hand, he had told him “let's go for a ride”. He had thrown Cody in the car and the tension between them had been physical, palpable, and for the whole time as he drove aimlessly with his fingers well clutched around the steering wheel he had kept looking around trying to find a place – any place, as close as possible – that could welcome them.

He had found that place – it seemed discreet enough. Somewhere no one would've come searching for them. Cody had followed him awkwardly, his eyes glued to the ground. Leo could see them fill with horror with every detail of the squalor of that place slowly sinking in.

He had made it a personal mission, once they were finally alone in the room, to help him warm up, to make sure he was once again filled with the longing desire he had been filled with before they left home. He had kissed him and touched him everywhere, he had answered in daring strokes to every “no” Cody whispered in between his moans. When Cody had finally yielded, abandoning himself to his arms with shaking hands and a prayer on his lips, the fierce sex that had followed had been one of Leo's greatest personal victories.

Afterward, though, staring at the yellow ceiling with its mold stains and the dark trembling shadow the naked light bulb cast on it with every swing, had been one of the most depressing moments of his life. There he was, lying naked next to one of the most beautiful people he knows, one of those he loves more, one of those he holds dearest to his heart, finally basking in post-orgasmic bliss after managing to take this person haunting him in his dreams for years, and he could feel nothing but sadness. Disappointment. Pity for him, and for himself. And on top of everything else, shrouding all in an even darker blanket, guilt.

Nothing has changed since that day, except for the fact that meeting here has become some kind of desperate routine both Cody and him grew accustomed to, even addicted, to some degree, and this has done nothing but make things even worse. It's how _cheap_ it all feels – Leo just can't get used to that. He thinks if Cody and him went on forever like this, meeting secretly to share a couple of hours of blessed togetherness for the rest of their life, he still wouldn't be able to ever stop feeling as if he was demeaning him, forcing him through all of this when, if he truly loved him, he should do everything in his power to spare him such a humiliation.

The problem is he loves him deeply, so deeply sometimes the magnitude of this love scares him, almost threatens him, but he can't spare him any of this because he needs him. And he wants him. And after surviving twenty years without laying a finger on him, now that he has him back he just can't go back at doing without him. It's just not possible – he feels something terrible would happen if he tried. His life, the normality of it, and the precarious balance of his mind, hang on a thread, and Cody's got that thread wrapped around his little finger. Even though he didn't do it on purpose – even though he probably doesn't even know that. Leo took that thread and tied it around his finger with a nice little bow, and now they’re bound together, forever.

Tonight, for some reason, Cody seems to feel even more awkward than he usually does. Leo tried to ask about it and Cody said something about Vince asking a lot of questions before he left, but it was obvious he didn't wanna get into it any more than he was doing, and Leo let it go. But it's hard to get close when feeling like shit keeps them at a distance – and Cody's been staring at the pouring rain out the window for ten minutes, now, while Leo took off his jacket and checked WhatsApp to give himself something to do, and now that he knows there are no texts, no missed calls and that Blaine's playing Pugopoly with the kids and will probably keep doing it until right before dinner, he's got nothing else to do except try and get close.

And he does.

He puts his hands on Cody's shoulders and he feels him shiver at the contact – he wonders why that is. It's a cold day. Perhaps it's just that. Perhaps it's something else. He doesn't know how to take that – he only likes to feel Cody shiver when they're having sex. Every other shiver speaks of fear, and he doesn't like that.

“What's up, sweetness?” he asks, leaning in and placing a soft kiss on the curve of Cody's neck, “I don't like to see you like this.”

Cody stretches a thin smile on his lips, leaning back against him. He weighs nothing. That always makes Leo want to lift him in his arms. “I don't know, some days are worse than others,” he simply says. He doesn't have to explain why.

“You make me feel guilty, if you speak like that...” Leo whispers against his skin, parting his lips and giving him a slightly wetter kiss.

“No... I don't want that,” Cody shakes his head, weakly, “I'm grateful for this. I am, I swear.”

“But you wish it was different,” Leo rests his forehead against the curve of Cody's shoulder, exhaling slowly. 

Cody takes his time answering. He knows that, when it comes to wishing for more, he's walking on broken glasses, and he has to thread carefully if he doesn't want to cut himself. “I wish I could lie less,” he says in the end, “I wish it was more comfortable. That the place felt more like...” he stops for a second, biting at his bottom lip. Leo watches him, hypnotized. He's so beautiful he doesn't even feel like an earthly creature. “...like us,” he says in the end, with a little shrug, “But I know I have to fly down. Don't worry. I'm not about to ask you for any change.”

It breaks his heart, really, to make Cody feel like this. To make him feel as if he had to justify every demand he makes regarding their relationship – even the smallest. To make him feel as if he should apologize for being with him, when Leo's the one who should do it, for taking him even though he knew he shouldn't have, for complicating things even though he knew he had no right to do so.

“…don’t speak like this,” he whispers on his skin, covering it in slow, chaste kisses, “Keep it out of this room. Everything. Keep it out. It’s just me and you here. And here is just a place. Everything is okay as long as we’re together. Okay?”

Cody doesn’t speak for a few seconds. He doesn’t say that’s just not true. He doesn’t say even if they pretend there’s nothing beside them, the rest of the world will still be waiting out of that door the very moment they walk out. He doesn’t say _everything_ is such a meager word when it speaks of only a part of reality, only a part of the truth, and that sometimes _everything_ is not enough when it’s only a fraction of what it could be.

He doesn’t say it, and though Leo reads it in his eyes they don’t speak about it. They leave sadness and regret in a little corner in their minds, they push it under a metaphorical rug and hope that’ll be enough to conceal it – just as long as it takes to enjoy a few precious moments of bliss.

Leo wraps Cody in his arms, pulling him closer. He dives in his hair with the tip of his nose, inhaling his scent. Vanilla and chocolate, as per usual. Cody’s always smelled of something edible – perhaps that’s the reason why Leo constantly wants to keep his mouth on him. It’s impossible to resist that smell, and the promise of his taste. He drags him to the bed, his whole body sings when Cody submissively falls unto the mattress making no sound. He seems designed for this – not just for sex but for being handled like this. He’s like a tiny, precious porcelain doll, the way he can fall into your arms makes you wanna break him and take the best care of him at the same time.

Pushed and pulled in all directions by contrasting desires, Leo climbs on top of him, makes him part his legs and slithers between them, pressing himself against his crotch, swinging his hips against him, rotating them, teasing them wildly until he hears him beg – and he’s so caught up in it, so lost running on the yellow brick road of Cody’s whiny dripping voice, he doesn’t even notice, at first, that Cody’s “please don’t stop” have turned into “wait, please, wait”s.

He opens his eyes when a desperate gasp and the furious sting of Cody’s nails digging into their shoulders bring him back to reality. Someone’s knocking at the door. This shouldn’t be possible. _Thud, thud_ , goes the fist against the wood, _thump, thump_ , goes his heart against his ribcage. What’s gonna get broken first?

He unglues himself from him, even though he doesn’t like the feeling. He covers Cody up with a blanket – this sad blanket in such a faded dark blue, the fabric so cheap and raggedy it always covers Cody’s pale skin in horrible red patches. He stands up and walks to the door. He chooses to speak through it.

“We’re busy,” he says.

“I know,” Blaine’s voice answers.

Leo’s mind short-circuits as he realizes who’s on the other side of the door. Blaine’s here. Blaine knows. Blaine’s here. And what’s even worse – a part of him always knew this moment would’ve come, at some point. A part of him was perhaps even _waiting_ for it, _hoping_ for it. Like a serial killer keeps using the same tricks and leaving marks and signatures to be found and stopped, he kept coming back, bringing Cody with, hoping at some point Blaine would’ve noticed, that he would’ve done something to put an end to it.

Now he’s doing it. He’s putting an end to it.

With his heart beating like crazy, feeling so numb he can barely feel the cold metal of the door handle against his fingers, Leo opens the door. Behind it, Blaine looks at him with such disappointed, hurt eyes Leo would prefer to die than to bear the weight of that gaze even for one second longer. And still, he survives. His heart is beating so furiously he’s surprised it hasn’t stopped yet, but he survives. He wishes he wouldn’t, and yet he survives.

Blaine walks into the room. Cody lets out a little yell and curls in a ball in a corner of the bed, the covers stretched up to cover his face up to his nose. His eyes filled with terror, Leo watches him shake and wishes he could at least spare him this. If he couldn’t spare him the humiliation of this place and the pain of having to lie to his own husband, if he couldn’t spare him heartache and regret twenty years ago, he wishes he could at least spare him Blaine’s judgmental gaze, and yet he can’t do that either.

Blaine mechanically turns back towards him. There’s no anger in his eyes, and that’s probably what hurts the most. Anger, Leo can understand. It’s a simple feeling, flat, violent, all-consuming. It doesn’t need a reason and at the same time it’s ridiculously easy to understand. Leo’s built to receive that signal – he doesn’t work equally well with the infinite shades of human sadness.

“We need to talk,” Blaine says in a toneless voice, “Close the door.”

_The moment I do that_ , Leo thinks, his fingers back on the handle, _The moment I do that, everything’s gonna be over._

He closes the door, fully expecting the world to be done, the sky to fall down on their heads and humanity to entirely disappear in the blink of an eye. He anticipates that – if all of that happened, at least he wouldn’t have to face the consequences of what he’s done.

He’s almost disappointed when he realizes none of that’s gonna happen. That the consequences of his actions will have to be borne while the world keeps spinning as if his life wasn’t over.

He closes the door and lets go of it, walking towards the bed like a prisoner sentenced to death walking the green mile. It’s kind of funny – he knows now that he was hoping Blaine would find out because he thought once the truth was out he’d have felt lighter. Instead, one step after the other, he only feels heavier.


End file.
